“New World Summit” – a congress with Jonas Staal

The New World Summit is an alternative parliament for political and juridical representatives of organizations currently placed on international terrorist lists. The nontransparent procedures by which these lists are created are considered a threat to democratic politics by numerous political parties, human rights organizations, lawyers, and philosophers. Often political prejudices, diplomatic relations, and economic or military interests play a decisive role in labeling an organization as a "terrorist group."

The parliament of the New World Summit forms a democratic supplement to the existing political order. The event questions those politics that are based on exclusion and deny any form of true political participation to those groups that have been listed. The New World Summit aims to articulate a new kind of public political space where representatives of the organizations debate the limits of the current democratic system. The referents who are participating in the summit are not prosecuted, but see themselves as agents of fundamental democratic principles. The event itself is based on a notion of fundamental democracy pursuing the ideal of an open, egalitarian society.

by Jonas Staal